Quran Challenge With My School Friends – Something For All Mums

How much Quran do you recite daily?

I’m a mum to a toddler, and if you know how busy toddlers are, you’ll also know what it’s like to have one eye looking at the beautiful words of Allah and the other watching the little person get up to all sorts of mischief. And it’s been like this from the day she came home!

But some months ago I came across this brilliant article. It explained how a group of sisters in Saudi started a WhatsApp group, which they used to recite the Quran every day. One sister was the admin who would ensure everyone was reciting the ayahs she set for the day. I loved the idea straight away! So I sent out a message to some friends asking whether they’d want to join me in starting a new challenge where we would recite 5 ayahs of the Quran daily and read the translation too. Five of my friends got back, wanting to eagerly start with the recitation. And Alhamdhulillah we started our very beautiful journey of falling in love with the Quran all over again. The reason I set only 5 ayahs a day was to help us get in the habit of reciting every single day and being able to reflect on the meaning more. I took inspiration from the following hadith:

“The deeds most loved by Allah (are those) done regularly, even if they are small.”


[Bukhari, Muslim]

It’s been 4 months since starting our group and we’re thoroughly enjoying it and learning so much. It’s perfect for mums or anyone who might find themselves drifting away from the Quran due to lack of time or even pure laziness. I’ve always loved reciting the Quran for long hours at times, but since having my daughter I just haven’t been able to dedicate the same time. This made me sad and I kept thinking about how much I used to enjoy it, especially when I was studying Tajweed. I felt I needed more structure in order to learn and love our Creator’s words again.

Many, if not all first time mums will agree: motherhood changes EVERYTHING! And it takes us a good part of the first year to come to terms with it all. Trying to fit in the fard ibadah becomes a challenge making any extra ibadah a burden. This led to me only reciting when I could, which meant sometimes I wasn’t reciting for a few days in a row. When you love something so dearly, your heart starts to feel heavy when you can’t spend time with it. And that’s exactly what happened. I missed the Quran and desperately needed to rebuild my relationship with it.

So, how does it work?! I’m the admin in the group. I put out a reminder around Fajr time every day on our WhatsApp group. Each member puts 2 thumbs-up emoticons when they’ve recited the set ayahs and have read the translation too.

Every so often, I try to share some motivational quotes relating to Quran recitation or just general spiritual reminders. I like this part too, as I feel I learn so much from it. During Ramadan, we increased the number of ayahs as we wanted to gain the extra reward the month offers. And I think as a group we enjoyed being part of this challenge the most in Ramadan.

I’ve never actually read the translation of the Quran cover to cover, so reading it alongside the daily recitation has become a very easy way of studying the Quran. When we come across something we don’t understand or find interesting we discuss it. One example being, when we as an Ummah were all very saddened by the recent attacks on the people of Gaza, at the time we were reciting Surah Al Ma’edah and Allah’s words comforted us greatly. Another example was when we started Surah Al An’am, I looked in Tafseer Ibn Kathir and found a hadith that stated the whole surah was revealed at night time in Makkah, accompanied by seventy thousand angels, raising their voices in glorification of Allah. [At Tabarani] Sharing small details with others just makes the experience of reciting the Quran more interesting and memorable.

I also want to stress that this challenge in no way makes Quran recitation a monotonous task – it is just a simple way of ensuring we continue to recite it regularly and a basic way of studying the meaning too. It’s actually a smooth, gentle push towards a better spiritual development that all believers crave and need. I asked the group to write something about this challenge from their point of view, so I could use it on here, and my dear friend Shazna Umm Aayah shared some amazing and kind words about it:

“Bismillah hir Rahman nir Rahim: Having made countless promises to myself of getting back to reciting the glorious Qur’an, on a regular basis, I, sadly, found myself in a situation where I allowed the so called ‘daily pressures of life’ to besiege me and my efforts to get closer to Allah (swt).
Me, my sisters and even my friends would often offer feeble utterances of, ‘we must try and recite the Qur’an more often’. However, our next sentences would then be filled with vain claims of having demanding careers or the strenuous job or balancing raising children with the burgeoning obligations of extended families.The truth of the matter was that I was scared. So very scared because I had forgotten nearly and all the rules of Tajweed and was struggling to recite the basic of sentences. Quietly, I was embarrassed and ashamed that I had allowed myself to get into such a deep and darkening hole of ignorance, and yes, I’m not ashamed to admit it, arrogance.Then, a miracle in a form of a friend suggested that we set up a Qur’an Challenge. Initially this frightened the very depths of my soul. What would I be required to do as part of this Qur’an Challenge? How much of my daily, ‘precious’ time would this take up? For I was the mother of two young and demanding children and I didn’t want to commit to anything too strenuous. Hesitantly, I heard Umm Yusra explained the rules of the Qur’an Challenge. Since beginning this challenge, we have recited together, discussed aayahs that we haven’t understood or just discussed our thoughts on the revelations in the miraculous Qur’an. The idea, although may say sound simple, is simply profound! The Qur’an Challenge has given me the push, that I needed to prioritise my life. Thanks to this challenge I have now taken up Tajweed classes, set up my own Qur’an Challenge, alongside this existing one, and am now confidently teaching my daughter the basics of learning and loving the Qur’an. As our beloved Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) said: ‘Acquire knowledge and impart it to people.’ At-Tirmidhi. As mothers, we are our children’s primary educators and we simply need to educate ourselves in order to educate the future Muslim Ummah. Lastly, on behalf of myself and my friends, on the Qur’an Challenge, I wish to deeply thank Umm Yusra for her relentless motivation and determination and we sincerely pray Allah (swt) rewards her, in abundance, for all her efforts”

All I can say is Alhamdhulillah for the day I came across such a beautiful and brilliant idea. I recommend it to all, but especially to mums that have very small children. Living in the secular West, where religion is always pushed as being a secondary matter in our lives, and where we find ourselves busy with so many other duties, dedicating quality time to the Quran both knowingly and unknowingly becomes a difficult task. I’ve found that the more we keep ourselves away from the Quran, the longer it takes us to go back to it.This challenge is ideal for both the eager minded Quran lovers and for the one who needs that extra nudge to start reciting the Quran more often.

Lastly, I think it’s very important to note why reciting the Quran is so important for us all. It is the last Message for the whole of mankind from Allah until Yaum ul Qiyamah. It tells us our purpose, instructs us to take it as Guidance and to live according to its legislation. I cannot using my own words give the Quran its due right, so I’d like to share the below hadith:

The Prophet (saw) said:
“The Quran is an intercessor, something given permission to intercede, and it is rightfully believed in. Whoever puts it in front of him, it will lead him to Paradise; whoever puts it behind him, it will steer him to the Hellfire.”

(At Tabarani)

May Allah allow us to make the Quran supreme in all matters of our lives. Ameen